Brownie McGhee; Singer, Guitarist Helped Spread Piedmont Blues

Brownie McGhee, a guitarist and singer who helped popularize the blues style of the Piedmont area of the Carolinas, has died. He was 80.

McGhee died of stomach cancer Feb. 16 at Summit Hospital here.

In the early 1940s, McGhee, a native of Knoxville, Tenn., and harmonica player Sonny Terry came together and started generating attention for the Piedmont blues, a mesh of guitar and harmonica.

The pair’s first engagement was a civil rights benefit in 1942. They went on to become popular on the New York folk scene in the 1940s, working with such artists as Woody Guthrie and Leadbelly.

When Terry joined the cast of “Finian’s Rainbow” in 1947, McGhee formed Brownie McGhee and His Mighty Rockers. He also founded a blues school in Harlem and worked as a studio musician.

Terry and McGhee worked together on Broadway in Tennessee William’s “Cat on a Hot Tin Roof” in the mid-1950s and later in Langston Hughes’ “Simply Heaven.”

McGhee appeared in the film “Angel Heart.” He founded the Blues Is Truth Foundation, designed to give scholarships to young musicians.

McGhee is survived by three daughters and three sons, 16 grandchildren and 22 great-grandchildren.